DENVER — In overdramatized terms, the Giants left their season up to Nic Jones and Beau Brade over Dexter Lawrence and Abdul Carter.
It went as badly as that sounds — the Giants are 2-5 after being oh, so close to a surging 3-4 — but it won’t cost defensive coordinator Shane Bowen his job.
“No, I’m not considering that,” head coach Brian Daboll said Monday when asked if he was making any changes to the coaching staff or play-calling responsibilities. “We all have to do a better job. It starts with me.”
Daboll is correct in falling on the sword and in repeating on loop that blowing a 19-point fourth-quarter lead and allowing 33 fourth-quarter points in a 33-32 loss to the Broncos doesn’t boil down to one play.
But the play — and the call made by Bowen — that drew the most ire from players and fans alike was the decision to only send Roy Robertson-Harris, Brian Burns and Kayvon Thibodeaux at quarterback Bo Nix and drop eight in coverage with 33 seconds remaining. The Pro Bowler Lawrence and first-round pick Carter watched from the sideline.
Linebacker Bobby Okereke sunk off into an intermediate zone to protect against a check-down completion and yards after the catch.
Because big-money free agent signings Jevón Holland and Paulson Adebo both were sidelined by knee injuries, the seven defensive backs included Jones (playing his second defensive snap of the season) and Brade (his first).
Not to mention Deonte Banks, the previously benched former first-round pick who quarterbacks target as soon as he steps on the field.
Marvin Mims Jr. caught a 29-yard pass with Dru Phillips draped on his back and five Giants encircling the ball.
“Leave that to the coaches,” Lawrence said Sunday after a long pause to gather thoughts when asked about not being more aggressive at the end of the game.
A livid Burns screamed up the tunnel after the loss about choosing to “drop eight” in coverage. That emotion turned somber as Burns shed tears at his locker.
Asked to expand on what he thought of the strategy of “rushing three, dropping eight,” Burns pursed his lips and did not answer.
So, are the Giants losing faith in Bowen? With the benefit of a 20-hour cool down period, it sounds that way.
“We’re all hands on deck,” Okereke said. “We’re all bought in. Everyone has to look at the man in the mirror.”
Daboll had plenty of time to dictate his preference for an aggressive or passive philosophy to Bowen before the Mims catch because it followed Jaxson Dart’s go-ahead touchdown run, a replay review, a missed PAT and a kickoff return.
It was reminiscent of when the Giants were in a similar final-seconds spot and deployed a similar light pass rush in Week 2 against the Cowboys, surrendering field position for the tying field goal and then the overtime victory.
Not the same play call — as Daboll pointed out in defense of Bowen — but the same passive approach that Bowen regretted then.
“I wish we would have been a little bit tighter [in coverage],” Bowen said on Sept. 18. “Just like all these calls that don’t work, [you] second-guess that you probably wish you went in a different direction.”
After one spike, Nix went at Banks for a 22-yard catch by Courtland Sutton that turned a would-be 61-yard field goal into a walk-off chip shot. The Giants sent four rushers on that play, but it was too little, too late at that point.
“I’m out there making plays that come to me,” Banks said. “I got picked on the second play — that was a great play by Sutton. Other than that, I feel like I was OK.”
Burns put the blame for the loss on the lack of execution by the players and tried to take heat off Daboll, but he didn’t mention Bowen one way or the other.
“We got put in a position where we could’ve won, but we gave it back to them. I put that all on us. We have to play better,” Burns said. “Dabes is going to take the blame — his fault and this and that. Nah.”
Burns and Lawrence both credited Bowen for calling a great game last week against the Eagles, after saying they urged him to be more aggressive.
You can bet John Mara feels that way.
It was Mara who first turned up the pressure on Bowen after last season, when he said he was “tired of watching teams go up and down the field on us.”
Daboll — who was turned away by several candidates before hiring Bowen in his 2024 coordinator search — opted to maintain the status quo. He fired two coordinators and four position coaches in his first three years.
“There are plenty of plays that we had opportunities to make throughout the fourth quarter,” Daboll said. “We just came up short.”
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